Vánagandr/History
History Infancy of Violence True monsters are men and women forged through conflict and chaos, mighty beings are thrown in a hellish life that no normal men could survive in, yet still manage to live and thrive. Before assuming the name of Vánagandr, the Captain of the Automata pirates was known as Otho Valerius, one of the many orphans of the decadent country of Midium, located in the Grand Line. Midium was land in many similar ways similar to the kingdom of Dressrossa, boasting a rich monarchy and a longstanding tradition of holding gladiator battles; yet, unlike the former, the ruling body of Midium eschewed pace and modesty instead of holding an opulent yet brutal empire over many of the smaller neighbor countries. Midium expansionistic views were always tolerated by the World Government as they paid them a lot of tributes and provided some sort of stability within the most turbulent part of the world. In particular, Midum had the fame of being one of the greatest centers of the slave trade in the region, rivaling even the imponent market established in the Sabaody Archipelago. Without any parents to remember, Vánagandr has little memories of his earlier life: he was spending all time munching in mud and dirt, finding what little scrapes he could just to survive. He remembered people looking at him with a mixture of terror and disgust, as even back then he growled and acted more than an undisciplined beast than a boy. One of the many gangs of scums and hoods, always hungry for new recruits and young mind to exploit, managed to convince the young boy to join in exchange for little food. Of the gang, Vánagandr recalled only the name “The Blight Furies”, as none of his members bothered to establish any sort of connection with the boy, merely calling the “Wolf Kid”. During one of the many skirmishes of the Blight Furies against many of their rival gangs, Vánagandr was struck in the face by one of the adults. A little more than a light slap to the boy, but that triggered within him a rage worth of a horde of devils. He launched a long, creepy howl and burst forward in a charge; he clawed and punched and bitten through anything on his way. Of the entire gang, the largest pieces left somehow recognizable was a hand with the longest two fingers severed; the rest was all pulped in a bloody mess. The Blight Furies run for their lives, fearing to be the next victims of the savage boy. Soon the fame of the little Vánagandr spread to the suburbs of the capital, voices of a born slaughtered in the form of a kid. Midium slave masters recognized the rare opportunity for a meal ticket; using Vánagandr desperate need for food, as his body was growing, they manage to lure in a cage made of Seastone and bring them to Amphitheatrum Vespasianum, the giant stage when Midium bloody and immense lucrative games were conducted every day, where masses found the little solace to distract them from the squalor of their everyday lives. When they opened the door of the cage, the young Vánagandr was inches close to butcher any of the poor captors who dared to come in the nearby. Yet one person managed not only to avoid being massacred but to defeat the beast without even fighting: an old man, yet sharp and spry as he was in his prime, gave the boy kind words and caresses, promising that nothing would have hurt him. That man was Batiullus Crixus, a veteran fighter in the Coliseum who had fought and won through innumerable battles, and, having lost in his family long time before, found the boy someone capable of replacing his losses. Vánagandr was given his first name Valerius from his foster faster, meaning ‘brave’, while his surname came to the reigning emperor of the time, as all orphans in Midium had a father in the emperor, a parent to whom they owed the utmost obedience and devotion. Growing up, Valerius’ talent as a warrior grew beyond the wildest expectations. Trained by his old foster father, he absorbed any technique and form Crixus taught, gaining mastery over various forms of gladiatorial combat. When thrown in the arena in the first fight of his life, he proved his mettle by besting warriors many times his size and age like they were mere babies, devastating them in the blink of an eye. Yet that was a problem for the slave masters, because the boy did not fight like sportsman nor to entertain the crowd, the very reason the gladiatorial matches were held in the first place, but like a raging demon: every time he entered the arena, he was almost possessed by an unfathomable bloodlust, an unquenchable desire to devour and destroy anything on his path, more blood-curdling than awe-inspiring. Despite the boy borderline supernatural attitude, Valerius’ seemed totally unable to get the best of his anger. Crixus, however, did not give up on the boy, knowing that, if the beast could be tamed, he could somehow by taught to tame himself: every day he meditated alongside his protegé, giving him the means to tap on his most powerful instincts without succumbing to them. The rambunctious Valerius scoffed those tentative, as they bored his childish mind: yet he loved his father, and would have done anything in his power to please him. As such, day after day, week after week, Valerius got a better and better grasp of the fury seethed inside his soul until he mastered it, thus become a master of his body. The day he got the best of his anger, Valerius’s reputation as a gladiator flew high, like fireworks in the sky. The entire city became enchanted of the prowess of this lone warrior, capable alone the most bloodthirsty hordes and the mightiest giant and always winning against each and every odd. The fellow gladiators of his school, once terrified by Valerius, became awed by him and flocked to the man to improve his combat capabilities. While Valerius was not the most sociable and friendliest of men, he believed that the right to do to honor his master was to spread his teachings among his fellow youth. Slowly but steadily, he became not only a comrade with many gladiators but a dear friend. Despite being only a slave, Valerius’ life was truly happy in this period, having found a family he could rely on and the constant pleasure from the battles of Coliseum. Once he blossomed at the peak of his maturity and at the rankings of the school, the slave masters of Midium sought that the time was ripe for a duel truly worthy of the young wolf. Valerius was brought into the arena to fight against any opponents: what he was shocked to find was his father Crixus clad in battle gears, ready to give his all. The announcer spoke the terms of the fight: father and son would have to fight in a duel to the death, or both would have been executed. A death sentence, with no chance of escape. The pupil did not want to hurt his beloved foster father, but Crixus himself insisted on his son going all out since that was the life of the gladiator. The duel that ensued was incredible, filled with twist and terms: to the public, they appeared to be equally matched, but an expert eye would have guessed Valerius’ victory since the first moment the two stepped in the sand. With a sharp cleave of his sword, the young gladiator offed his foster father, granting a quick and painless death, Crixus’ smiling head on the sand. While victorious, Valerius was the one who suffered the most: the gladiatorial combat which has brought him nothing joining had just destroyed the dearest he had in his life. He returned silently to his cell, crying the whole night. Fortunately for him, he had his fellow gladiators to share his pain with. They cheered up Valerius, soothing the sorrow with their companionship and comradery. He found welcome arms to soothe, the loving embrace of a woman to keep him warm the night he felt more alone. On the surface, life seemed to return at his normal stage for Valerius, a constant stream matches of brutal he won without effort. But seeds of doubts had taken place in his mind: he could no longer relish the thrill of fighting, knowing that his masters may have ordered to butcher the people he loved the most in any moment, like pigs on a rich banquet. The blood of gladiators, the fine art of spectacle and martial display, beauty thrown at the feet of hogs, ungrateful, pampered bastards who did not know anything about honor. These thoughts weren’t his own alone; many of his brothers and sisters in arm were whispering about a life without saddles, where they could be free to fight only for the wars they believed in. The Price of War Those were surely the seeds of a rebellion, a war which surely would have ground Midium’s entertainment machine. But Valerius’ masters, while incredibly bloodthirsty, were no fools: they were spying their precious palestra all along, carefully picking even the slightest sign of turmoil from their glorified meal tickets. Instead of squashing the recalcitrant fighter for suspect insubordination, they opted for appeasement as a tactic. Midium expansionistic policy, ultimately, caused enormous fear in the nearby, which coalesced in alliance to stop. Having obtained a silent approval from the Government, who could not close an eye on Midium’s constant warfare anymore, the gathered a massive mercenary army and waged open war. Desperately in need of as many soldiers as possible, emperor Otho conscripted the gladiators, offering freedom and a stable place in the militia should they prove their worth in battle. Knowing they little choice, the gladiators had to accept the offer and fight their first battle in a true war. Some of them did wholeheartedly, believing it was a chance in a million to escape slavery; others, however, were far more suspicious of Otho’s sudden display of benevolence, as they had simply traded a life of slaughter and servitude in a small arena for a much larger one. Valerius’ anger toward his masters still burned strong, but he did not want to deny his friend the chance of freedom. They sailed in the midday of autumn, the sea breeze gently brazing on the gladiator's face for the first time. Looking at the ship he had to sail in, at his opulent and shimmer hull, the enthusiasm almost getting the best of Valerius’ grim predisposition. He almost dared feeling optimism. The place of battle was the Dragon’s Maw, a jagged death trap for ships, perfect to engage a numerically superior opponent. The departure of the fleet was greeted with roaring applauses, petals falling over and the reverent blessing of the emperor. The Dragon’s Maw, however, welcomed the fleet in utter silence. There was no trace of an enemy, a sea so dead calm it almost felt fuming; moreover, the sky was met with a purple haze. Nobody had a clue of why no soul was there to be found; the commander-in-chief screamed for answers, demanding for the head of anybody who had dared to make a fool of Midium’s military might. Soon after, however, he ended up coughing blood. Every person in the fleet was feeling weaker, dizzier, almost constantly nauseated. Valerius felt his body shaking and sweated more profusely than he ever did. Believing they had incurred in a curse of treacherous trick, that the purple haze was venomous, all ships sailed back in panic to Midium, ready to face a race against time to be cured before the poison had killed them all. They failed. At the first day of travel, more than half of Midium grand fleet had been succumbed, laying down rigid, blights spreading across their face. The second day, all but the harshest fighters had survived their encounter on the mist, praying God to deliver them a swift death. At the end of the third Midium, Valerius was surrounded by nothing but cadavers. Totally lost in the mist of the sea, he had nothing but wait, barely able to stand among his fallen friends. His brother and sisters, his lover… the people he shared his life with, cowardly killed while they were one step closer to freedom, not even getting a death worthy of warriors. Valerius spent the last two days crying, cradling to his comrades, in the mad belief they might have woken up. When the sixth day came, the enemy insignias were finally on sight. Despite everything that had happened, Valerius still carried his small battle axes and gladius with him. Amidst the desperation, his mind was focused, his purpose clear. The alliance armada alliance had an easy game in flanking the ships, turned in lifeless husks, aimlessly floating in the embalmed sea. They all cheered, believing they have scored a clear and easy victory. Valerius soon flipped their tables. He stood tall above the mast of his ship, looming over the man and women who boarded the empty deck. Leaping off his higher ground, Valerius welcomed the invaders with a hellish owl and firm steel. The enemy soldiers were initially confounded by such survival, believing that it was impossible for a mere human to withstand the strength of their experimental weapon. What they found in Valerius was even more terrifying: that withered man smothered by blight was moving sharper and faster than anything they had witnessed, massacring them one by one. None of the well-fed soldiers was able to hold a candle to Valerius’ unbridled ferocity, which seemed only to grow stronger as wounds and damages were piling upon him. Sending more of their waves, more of their elites proved to be just as useless; their more glorified champions were less than toddlers in Valerius' eyes’. Stripped away of everything, Valerius had become something akin to rage incarnate. He had stopped caring about any semblance of honor, piety, and showmanship, the qualities his father and companions have nurtured so much to the very end, the highest virtues of gladiators. Valerius had no love for the murderers of his friend. He slashed, owls, sank his blades, kicks, elbows and even teeth in every spared piece of flesh he could grab. But that savagery was not the surrender of his lucidity: rather, Valerius was totally resigned to his fate. He was sure he had to die, his lungs were already being cluttered by cysts; better going in hell in a last blaze of glory instead, surrounded by the corpses of his enemies. Valerius fought and killed, filling the deck with severed arts and maimed remains. The enemy fleet had stopped sending waves of cattle. Ships retreated from the boarding, perhaps thinking of ending the lone man with sheer artillery since the might of their soldiers had proven to be useless. Valerius clenched his fists, vomited insults and curses to the cowardice of his enemies. His eager to fight was so great, that he abandoned his vessel with a bound, landing of the first enemy ship he could find off. Valerius found far more soldiers than before, all took aghast and soiled by the demon. He was probably on one of their flagships, as he noticed a more comfortable deck and soldier clad in much better close. Ha cared not, and killed with the same abandon, the same ease. Neither his enemies cared too much, though; by that point, the leper demon had terrorized them so much, they deemed an acceptable loss to just let him pill apart their best ships and further their gap. In the enemy ships had put enough distance between them and Valerius, they all fired in the hole, a storm of cannonballs blitzing and tearing off pieces of wood. Lone, in a nearly sunken vessel, Valerius could barely understand his situation. His eyes turned red, his mouth gorged in foam. A sound came from the depth of Valerius' throat, a scream so potent the air around him fractured and burst, a thundering roar amplified a reverberated to a hellish degree. The entire army had barely the time to cover their ears to endure the hellish shout. They all fell, thousands of soldiers, sailors and officers knocked out senseless aboard their vessel. The multitude of projectiles stopped. Valerius did not smile nor he roared again: that shriek had taken all the rage he had in his body, making it explode in one, single blow. Exhausted, he fell to his knees, waiting for the sinking of his vessel or the poison was tearing his body apart to put an end to his life. His last thoughts, before he lost consciousness, were to his companions and to his foster. They all smiled at him as if they were waiting from the other side. Few tears dripped from his closing eyes. But Valerius’ days on earth were not over: the whims of fate, or better yet, of a man, had other plans for the wolf man… Synopsis Duel at a Dread Night Instructing a Pup Major Battles References